ades Karduniash
(695 B.C.); Nirgal-ushezib and Mushesib-marduk at Babylon (693-689
B.C.)--Sennacherib invades Elam (693 B.C.): battle of Khalule (692
B.C.), siege and destruction of Babylon (689 B.C.)--Buildings of
Sennacherib at Nineveh: his palace at Kouyunjik; its decoration with
battle, hunting, and building scenes._

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CHAPTER I--SENNACHERIB (705-681 B.C.)

_The struggle of Sennacherib with Judaea and Egypt--Destruction of
Babylon._

Sennacherib either failed to inherit his father's good fortune, or
lacked his ability.* He was not deficient in military genius, nor in the
energy necessary to withstand the various enemies who rose against
him at widely removed points of his frontier, but he had neither the
adaptability of character nor the delicate tact required to manage
successfully the heterogeneous elements combined under his sway.

* The two principal documents for the reign of Sennacherib
are engraved on cylinders: the Taylor Cylinder and the
Bellino Cylinder, duplicates of which, more or less perfect,
exist in the collections of the British Museum. The Taylor
Cylinder, found at Kouyunjik or Usebi-Yunus, contains the
history or the first eight years of this reign; the Bellino
Cylinder treats of the two first years of the reign.

He lacked the wisdom to conciliate the vanquished, or opportunely to
check his own repressive measures; he destroyed towns, massacred entire
tribes, and laid whole tracts of country waste, and by failing to
repeople these with captive exiles from other nations, or to import
colonists in sufficient numbers, he found himself towards the end of
his reign ruling over a sparsely inhabited desert where his father had
bequeathed to him flourishing provinces and populous cities. His was
the system of the first Assyrian conquerors, Shalmaneser III. and
Assur-nazir-pal, substituted for that of Tiglath-pileser III. and
Sargon. The assimilation of the conquered peoples to their conquerors
was retarded, tribute was no longer paid regularly, and the loss of
revenue under this head was not compensated by the uncertain increase
in the spoils obtained by war; the recruiting of the army, rendered more
difficult by the depopulation of revolted districts, weighed heavier
still on those which remained faithful, and began, as in former times,
to exhaust the nation. The news of Sargon's murder, published throughout
the Easter